1. Technical Field
One or more embodiments relate to digital standardized image characters. More specifically, one or more embodiments of the present invention relate to systems and methods for identifying and utilizing contextual meaning of digital standardized image characters in computing systems.
2. Background and Relevant Art
The rising prevalence of computing devices has changed the way that individuals and businesses communicate and interact. In fact, the popularity of computing devices has fundamentally changed the actual language of communication. For example, as a result of the increased use of instant messaging and texting, terms such as “lol” and “bff” have become commonplace in the English lexicon. Similarly, the “#” symbol has transformed itself from a character generally meaning “number” or “pound” into the ubiquitous “hashtag,” now commonly utilized to flag electronic content, such as social media posts.
Likewise, largely as a result of the increased use of computing devices, individuals now commonly utilize digital standardized image characters (e.g., emoji) to express themselves in electronic communications. Indeed, smiley faces, hearts, thumbs-up, and other standardized image characters now commonly replace words in many electronic documents, such as social media posts, e-mails, texts, tags, comments, or instant messages. In fact, it is now common to combine both a “hashtag” and digital standardized image characters (e.g., emoji) to tag electronic documents (e.g., #whathasthisworldcometo).
Despite the increasing prevalence of standardized image characters, very few systems provide a means of incorporating or analyzing standardized image characters into computing systems. For instance, most common computing systems do little more than provide, send, and receive standardized image characters. Often, common computing systems provide little support for standardized image characters because the use of digital standardized image characters introduces a number of problems not normally encountered with regard to manipulation and utilization of other alphabetic or numerical characters.
For example, unlike words or numbers, standardized image characters (e.g., emoji) do not have well-defined meanings or usage rules (e.g., spelling or grammar rules). Similarly, unlike traditional alphabetic or numeric characters, familiarity with standardized image characters varies wildly amongst users. For example, some individuals have never (or very rarely) utilized standardized image characters, while other individuals utilize standardized image characters as frequently as alpha-numeric characters. Moreover, in light of the recent, rapid, and continuing evolution of standardized image characters, the meaning and usage of individual standardized image characters varies rapidly over time and significantly amongst groups or populations.
In addition, standardized image characters are often expressed in terms of code that are much more difficult to identify than traditional alpha-numeric symbols. Indeed, the syntax of a particular emoji may differ from platform to platform and code base to code base. Similarly, different emoji are expressed utilizing different numbers of code points and variant characters. Furthermore, in contrast to traditional alpha-numeric characters, standardized image characters are constantly being added or revised over time.
Accordingly, there is much to be considered in terms of identifying and utilizing digital standardized image characters in computing systems.